Pearson launched a new Plug & Play Platform today, giving developers access to three major content resources of the publisher: the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, FT Press and the Eyewitness Guide to London.

Especially the first two APIs should be very interesting for startups that are planning to launch and application or webservice in the ESL space and there will be more datasets added to the platform based on the feedback of the developers.

The platform will offer a sandbox where developers can explore and test the API prior to building a full blown application and Pearson is already show casing two uses of the FT and Eyewitness data.

Keeping in mind that Pearson is also one of the major textbook publishers, this could be an interesting option for the company to get a foot in the increasingly crowded e-textbook market.